


Soundless

by astoryandasong



Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-12
Updated: 2011-12-12
Packaged: 2017-10-27 06:29:25
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/292645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/astoryandasong/pseuds/astoryandasong
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A silent moment in the snow.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Soundless

In later life, Joe Toye told a man that the one you never heard was the one that got you. He didn't say that's the one that hurts the most, but the implication was there, even if it never appeared in the book. When the shell hit him in that forest (he can't say the name. It's winter and too close) the whole place seemed dulled, as if Blythe's hysterical blindess had transformed to deafness and settled in him. Malarkey told him later he'd been yelling loud enough to wake the dead.

Toye couldn't remember making a sound. You couldn't help but hear Guarnere. He had a loud, deep voice, and lots of opinions he used it to voice. But Toye never heard Bill coming, not really. He heard the gripes and jokes and occasional sobs, but he never heard the other things Bill said, things like I love you and please, please don't leave me. He said it underneath everything else, that was the problem, he couldn't say it any other way. Neither of them (none of them, he thinks now)had ever been brought up to know how. The foxholes were cramped, snowy, wet and cold, but you breathed a little easier when you were in one. The open ground was vulnerable, and when you walked around between them even under the cover of darkness you felt terribly small, terribly human and achingly vulnerable, like a newborn baby.

Toye thought foxholes were a crock of shit, but he stayed in his anyways. Guarnere was supposed to be in with Luz tonight but he'd found his way into Toye's foxhole and stayed with his usual amiable bullshit. The ones you don't hear are the ones that stay with you forever. Toye woke up in the middle of the night to find Guarnere's mouth barely an inch from his. The warm puffs of his breath felt strangely pleasant on his face, a single spot of warmth on an otherwise freezing body. He had a choice; either he could wake Bill up and they could both bluster and joke around (how many of them did that?) or he could stay this way and watch Bill sleep. It must have hit him then, but he didn't notice, he just brushed Bill's face with frozen fingers and let him sleep.


End file.
